Deep in the Meadow

|18| Johanna Mason

"I asked a SIMPLE question to Peeta yesterday." West exclaims while standing outside out cells. His face is red with rage. Luckily he never found out about Selena and what happened last night.
"Yet, he still wouldn't budge! You are lucky that I didn't kill him on the spot for disobeying me. All I asked is where that Johanna Mason tribute is. It's very simple. But it seems he would rather have you all tortured instead of giving me the location on Johanna." He says as irritated as ever.

"Why are you even interested in Johanna Mason anyways?" I ask remembering him ask about her before.

"Because of my beloved daughter Celestia, that's why." He answers, then orders Kennedy and Will to gather some workers.

Peeta clears his voice, and by the way he looks, he is still recovering from being knocked out yesterday.
"What do Celestia and Johanna have to do with each other?" He questions.

West shoots him a hateful look. I think he has grown to hate Peeta as much as Snow did.
"If you MUST know, Johanna was in the rather large group of rebels that broke into the mansion during the rebellion, and killed Celestia. And I know that there were others that helped kill her, but she is the only one I care about because.... Johanna was my daughters favorite tribute. She adored watching her games. In fact, she recommended watching the 71st games clip for the hunger games 75th anniversary." He says.
"So I'm going to kill that girl, and I don't care what you think about it, whether you tell me where she is or not. I'm releasing 2 mutts and programming them on her scent so they can hunt her down and kill her. I didn't want to waste two perfectly fine mutts on her, but Peeta over there, gives me no other choice. Speaking of Peeta, it's time for your torture, all of you." He grins evilly.

Will and Kennedy walk back up to West with four torturers trailing behind them. West smirks.
"Great. Now assign them their jobs and get to work. I have to send off those mutts." West orders and hurries off to the training room.

Willow is drawing pretend shapes on the concrete floor and Peeta has sat on his table.

The torturers murmur amongst each other with Kennedy and Will, and once they are done, I watch as Will rolls over a desk with various tools on it.

"You know what to do! Now get to it!" Kennedy shouts and the torturers surround the desk grabbing what they want.
"You don't want to disappoint Thaumaturge West!" He yells. I catch one worker picking up a knife, and he rolls his eyes at Kennedy.

The workers each pick the cell they want and stand in front of it. Peeta gets a man, Rye a lady, Willow a lady, and I get a man. They enter the cell they stand in front of in unison, but Kennedy and Will are already distracted by something else and are barely paying attention.

The man that came in mine, has short, curly blond hair and I immediately recognize him. He's the guy that kept watching me along with Selena. From what I've observe, Selena and him seem to be friends.

The lady who Willow got, scoops her up without being gentle and sets her roughly on the table. Then I watch helpless as she is clamped on the table.

"Stand." The man in front of me says.
I obey and stand.

"Now lay on that table." He tells me and I do as he says. No matter what I do, it won't change that I'm getting tortured.

He clamps me down and I feel useless. Helpless. I hear Willow say something but I can't make it out. The man looks at the lady in Willow's cell who is organizing her torture tools on the extra room on top of the table.
She shoots him a look back which is odd, then she peers at the torturer in Peeta's then in Rye's cell. The torturers each return the look as if they are secretly saying things to each other.
Someone clears their throat from behind our cells and I bend my head as far as possible to see who it is. When I catch a glimpse of the person, I gasp.

Selena.

She turns back around and continues what she is doing, trying not to draw Kennedy and Will's attention. Then out of no where, the man in my cell draws out a knife. I flinch. I'm confused.

He leans down and points the knife at my arm.

"Listen." He whispers in my ear pretending to cut me using the knife.
"I'm a friend of Selena. My name is Oden. In fact, everyone that was assigned to torture your family today is part of the Capitol Alliance and West doesn't know it. We all have one of these." He whispers and pulls out a Mockingjay coin just like Selena's but with his name, and member 27 printed on it in. That means he is sided with me. And so is the rest of the tortures torturing our family today.

"I want you and your family to live as much as Selena does, so the four of us torturers are not going to torture you. We wouldn't even be here if we weren't forced to. All you have to do is pretend to scream and act like your being tortured. Just trust me. This will all be explained to you by Selena tonight." He concludes talking fast and backs away from my ear.

I'm confused and happy and concerned all at once, but I don't have much time for it before I'm interrupted by Peeta's fake shrieks.

They almost sound real but I can tell the difference. His torturer looks relived.

Up next, Rye starts to cry. It's not fake of course, but it defiantly looks like he is being tortured. The lady is leaned over top of him holding a syringe without a needle. She pretends to be hurting him when really he is just crying because she is leaned over him and poking him with a blunt shot.

I yell with as much horror as possible as Oden spreads fake blood across my arm and smears it over my shirt, making it look like I have a wound. I try my best to make it sound real, but there is something different about fake screaming.

Up next I hear Willow. I peer over at her and hold back a smile when I see the lady tuck a lollypop in her hand while she screams as loud as she can, with a hidden smile on her face.
Selena was right. Most of the workers are on the Capitol Alliance.

•

(5 hours later)
West has returned. He tosses wipes in my cell and I clean off the "blood" on me. It's funny how he thinks it's real. I can tell he has no idea about the distrust amongst his workers.

Willow sits behind her table and hides the empty lollypop stick. West totally ignores her not knowing what she is doing, and goes all the way over to Peeta.
He throws him wipes too because of the "blood" on him, and then he steps away so we can all see him clearly.

"I have news for you, Mellark family." West says smiling.

Goosebumps cascade my arms knowing that he has something to tell us. And coming from him, it isn't going to be enjoyable. Especially sense he thinks it's enjoyable.

"KENNEDY!" He yells for his second in command. I turn around to see Kennedy walk from the training room.
"BRING THE LITTLE REBEL!" West orders still smiling. My stomachs drops.

No sooner, I see the two mutts West ordered to find Johanna, haul Johanna Mason blindfolded and handcuffed from the training room. She struggles and fights the mutts but they are unmoving.

"That's right Katniss and Peeta! My mission was a success! You now have a new cell buddy!" He cheers as Peeta and I watch in horror as Johanna is brought into the torture gym.

He captured Johanna.